Meet Bethany Tew: Ulcerative Colitis Thriver & Rectal Cancer Survivor

Meet Bethany Tew, an Ulcerative Colitis Thriver & Rectal Cancer Survivor. Learn about her journey from diagnosis to recovery from treatment, and how she manages her mental and physical health while living life beyond cancer. 

How did your cancer journey begin?

My cancer journey began in 2023. In November, I wasn’t really well and had a lot of pain in my bum area, so much that I couldn’t even sit down. We went to my local GP (General Practitioner), and he said, “Oh, it’s just a pile (hemorrhoid),” and he gave me some treatment for that. Over Christmas, it started getting worse and worse. I rang the doctors again, who gave me a different medication.

My family and I travelled to New Zealand for a month. In hindsight, my health was not where it should have been for such a big trip; I really shouldn’t have gone. While in New Zealand, I was emailing my colorectal nurse/ileostomy nurse, telling her that I was in pain and I needed to see someone urgently. When I returned home in February, I had my first endoscopy. The doctor said there wasn’t anything to be concerned about, but did a few biopsies, and put me on steroids and suppositories to try to ease the pain.

Why did I already have a colorectal/ileostomy nurse before my diagnosis?

Let’s go back a few years. In 2012, I became ill with ulcerative colitis. I had this condition before 2012, but it took me quite a long time to receive a diagnosis. As soon as I received that diagnosis, I completed a year of treatment, and I received the highest form of Infliximab infusions available. They had no effect on my condition. Then, I underwent an ileostomy procedure. This was done in a way that would hopefully be reversible. My large intestine was removed, but the rectal stump was left so they could hopefully reattach it someday. This stump was what was causing me issues in 2023.

Back to the current timeline, I had just completed my first endoscopy, then I had three more hospital appointments. They gave me various medications to try and manage my pain and stop my stump from bleeding, a new symptom I was struggling with. The stump was bleeding so much and the pain was so unbearable. I found it difficult to sit for long periods of time; sometimes the pain got so bad that I couldn’t drive or go to work.

On the 22nd of May, I had another endoscopy with my surgeon. He wasn’t satisfied with the poor results we were receiving from the medications. This surgeon’s endoscopy was more in-depth, and he found an abscess at the very entrance of my rectal stump. Beyond that, at the end of the stump, he discovered a white mass that he took biopsies of. He ran multiple tests on the biopsies taken, and from those tests, they confirmed it was cancer. I received my official Stage II Rectal Cancer diagnosis on the 8th of June. 

The original hope of my ileostomy was that one day they would be able to reattach my small intestine to my stump, a procedure known as a “J pouch”, allowing my bowel to function near normal again. My other option was to have my rectal stump removed, but my surgeon recommended that I should delay either procedure until after I have any children due to the invasive procedures involved.

After they discovered that the stump was cancerous, what line of treatment did they prescribe for you? 

On the 8th of June, I received my cancer diagnosis. On Saturday, the 9th of June, I was scheduled for a procedure to remove the abscess causing the pain. If it was not for the symptoms from the abscess, they wouldn’t have found the cancer. 

My surgeon got me in touch with the oncologist, who arranged for my egg retrieval at the Newcastle Fertility clinic at the Centre for Life in Newcastle. I still wasn’t sure if I wanted to have kids, but I wanted to have the option in the future. The doctors weren’t sure what treatment I would have to have or what effect the treatment would have on my fertility. I travelled to Newcastle for a consultation at the fertility clinic before commencing a course of fertility treatments to get myself ready for egg retrieval. On the 19th of June, I started my fertility course, which consisted of a course of injections. On the 5th of July, the doctors retrieved five eggs that are now frozen for future use. 

Then, on the 14th of August, I started my treatment of immunotherapy.

Originally, they thought my cancer was hereditary, hence the immunotherapy. They later realised my cancer wasn’t hereditary, but the immunotherapy still worked amazingly against my cancer. My tumour shrank quite a lot through the process. My original cancer tumor was 8.5 centimeters in diameter; the immunotherapy caused it to shrink by 3.5 centimeters, so it was now at 5 centimeters. The oncologist said that a shrink that drastic was amazing from just immunotherapy. They decided to keep on that line of treatment since it worked so well for me. Unfortunately, shortly after this good news, the side effects from the immunotherapy became too overwhelming for my treatment to continue.

On the 15th of April in 2025, I had my operation to fully remove the tumour. They removed the tumour and my stump, leaving me with my ileostomy. I’m all sewn up, so I can’t have my ileostomy reversed in the future. Once that surgery was completed, the doctors told me that I didn’t need any further treatment. They had taken out 24 lymph nodes for testing, and they all came back clear. There’s no sign of cancer, so I’ve officially finished treatment and rang the bell on the 10th of June, 2025.

What do you want others to know about Ulcerative Colitis?

Ulcerative Colitis is hard on the body, and symptoms vary from person to person. I struggled a lot with bleeding and was often tired or had little motivation. Also, the constant need to be near a toilet restricted me a lot. The medication can take its toll; I was on a lot of steroids, and as a result, my joints have painful flare-ups. 

When I was first diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis back in 2013, I found that there wasn’t much information readily available and not many people I knew had heard of it. I found it hard to talk about while learning how my body and mind were coping with the symptoms.

So try to be understanding towards friends if they can’t go out all of a sudden. When you’re organizing an activity and someone with an IBD cancels at the last minute, it’s not because they want to, they have no other option. This happened to me a lot. At one point, I was quite confined to my house, afraid of not knowing what would happen if I left. I noticed I said no to a lot of days out and trips due to either my ill health or the fear of what could happen if I couldn’t get to the toilet in time. 

There are amazing charities that do a lot of work to try and bolster the awareness of Crohn's and Colitis. I find now more people are aware of this condition and are more open to talking about it. I am even a part of social media groups where people discuss their concerns and where other members give useful advice, or just their own positive stories, which is always great to see. There’s even a slogan used by charities saying, “Get the stigma out of stomas.” 

When I got my ileostomy, none of my friends knew what it was. I explained a lot of it to them because they were curious. Now, they come to me and say, “Oh,did you hear about this celebrity or this other  person’s story with ulcerative colitis?” It’s encouraging to see that people are more aware of it now and this hopefully makes living with this awful condition slightly easier for people getting newly diagnosed.

Mental Health and Cancer: Let’s Talk About It

This cancer journey has turned me into an emotional wreck. Whenever I tried to talk about it, I would just end up crying and not being able to find the right words. 

It seems it was so quick from the diagnosis, to treatment, to now being clear, although my path has taken over two years. I don’t think I fully accepted the cancer diagnosis before my operation. It was so quick, especially since I know of people who’ve gone through treatment for years. For me, it feels like a bit of whiplash, how quick it all has been. It’s has been really hard at times. But since I have been a part of a Macmillan support group called Hope, where other people who have been through cancer offer support and advice. I found these sessions, which included techniques for mindfulness, very helpful and I have seen a great change in my mental health. I even did further therapy which has just built on my coping mechanisms. 

Even now, I’m dealing with the side effects of cancer treatment. It gets to me mentally sometimes, and I find myself more able to work through that now. My immunotherapy affected my lungs, which resulted in me getting diagnosed with pneumonitis. I get out of breath often and was constantly coughing. I got to the point where I needed a wheelchair to get around as I no longer could walk any distance. In the past few months, I have had further lung function test and CT scans, which show my lungs are healing and with the help of a new inhaler my breathing is getting a lot better. Now, my doctor says I have now got asthma, but my lungs have no scarring on them from the pneumonitis, which is great news.

My childhood best friend who has known me since I was 2, has been there through everything with me. On days when I’m a bit upset, she’ll ask, “Why are you upset?” I’ll say, “I don’t know.” She will sit me down and say, “I need to know so I can help.” Sometimes I’m upset over such stupid things, but she truly wants to know, so she can help talk me through what I’m feeling. She always says, “If you ever feel down, let me know." She has seen me go through struggles with ulcerative colitis and that first operation. She has always been there for me. So when I got my cancer diagnosis, she was the first non-family member I told and rang to let her know what had been said during my appointments. She would then come round to me straight away and just talk. Every step she has been there for me, and I am so lucky I have her in my life. 

Do you have advice for anyone who is facing a cancer diagnosis or recurrence?

Try to stay positive and not think the worst. It is easier said than done sometimes, but try and keep a positive outlook, try and keep your mind occupied. I would take books or listen to a lot of podcasts to try and stop myself from overthinking. Also, just talking to your nurses while you’re getting your treatment helps. The nurses are brilliant, and they are there to listen to you, especially at the unit I went to. My nurse was like, “Here’s a cup of tea, here’s biscuits.” Just that offer of a cup of tea helped me so much to just stop and relax. When I first started coughing and had a chest infection, the nurses caught it straight away and helped me right away. So discuss every little issue you might have.

The day after the diagnosis came through, I was in the operating room having the abscess removed. Then days after, my phone was always receiving new appointments and phone calls from various nurses, my phone didn’t stop ringing for weeks until I started Immunotherapy. It was just one thing after another. Then there was also the journey for my egg retrieval which meant trips to Newcastle, an 80-mile round trip each time. The injections and procedure to retreive the eggs brought a lot of emotions for me.

Saying “I have cancer” was such a difficult sentence for me. Every now and again, I just stop and look at my mom or my dad and say, “I’ve got cancer.” Every time I said it, it took a bit of the weight off. I was trying to ignore the fact that I had it, so every step towards acceptance helped me get through the treatment. I found it silly, but by actually saying the words “I have cancer,” I felt more grounded. It made me understand that this was the actual reality.

How did having cancer shift your relationships with friends and family?

I’ve got three different group chats. All of my friends in those chats have stepped up so brilliantly. I had a friend who lived pretty far away from me, and she traveled 60 miles when I went into the hospital before my operation to visit me, just to spend time with me watching documentaries and catching up, but mainly to distract me from worrying, she even made the journey again when I got diagnosed with pneumonia, it was quite severe because I was in the hospital for 10 days. She just drove up, sat in the hospital with me for the whole visit, and then drove back. She didn’t have to, but it was so great for her to drop what she was doing to come and see me. 

Another one of my friends would text me, “We’re going out today.” She would drive by, pick me up, and take me somewhere for the day, I would tell her, “Sorry, I get out of breath, so I can’t talk too much,” and she never made a big deal of it. My childhood best friend did the Manchester marathon to raise money for Bowel Cancer UK.  She would get in touch, saying, “What do you need? Do you need me to come around for a bit?” we would just sit with a cup of tea and talk about anything and everything.

My dad’s brother lives 104 miles from us, and his family constantly sends gifts through the post, things like Lego sets and the occasional flower bouquet, just to try and cheer me up and keep me busy. They were in a serious car accident right before my operation, which they have luckily been recovering from, but even when my Aunt was in the ICU, she said, “We need to send Beth something!”  Because she was in ICU and my immune system was very weak, I was unable to visit her, but I managed to send her a Jellycat dog to keep her company. It was my way of being there for her, until I could go and visit myself. Luckily, she is now home recovering well. 

That support, even from so far away, means so much.  My community has been a big blanket of support for my family and me. 

I get quite emotional thinking about how lucky and loved I am. My job is with a very small team of people at a heritage site. I work at an old Historic monument. They’ve been so brilliant and supportive, giving me the space I need to get through it all. Even now, they message me, “When are you coming back? Not rushing you, we just really miss you.” All the love I feel can be so overwhelming. You don’t realize how many people care for you until something like this happens. 

I will say one thing. Every time I’ve had an appointment for my treatments or immunotherapy, my mom and dad have always been there. Either one or both of them have been with me every step. I think it’s been really hard for them, and I’ve worried about how much stress this situation is putting on them. When I had pneumonia, my dad told his work that he couldn’t come in because he needed to be with me. His employer said not to worry about it and gave him all the time he needed. My parents have been absolute stars. I love them so much. 

What do you want others to know about life beyond cancer?

At the moment, life beyond cancer is kind of hard. I’m very restricted in what I can do. I try to go out, but it’s hard with my breathing difficulties. I am starting to see an improvement, and I am able now to go out more and more. 

This summer, I went away with my parents for a few days, and it felt like there was a whole world out there to explore again. I want to go back out and explore. 

When you ring the bell, everyone thinks, “That’s it. You’re fine.” Obviously, I’m still dealing with the aftereffects of my treatment. I’m still struggling with my breathing and coughing. I’m not sleeping well. I am cured from cancer, but I’ve still got a long way to go. I will get there one day, I know that I will. Some days are just harder than others. Getting outside even just to go to the town centre where I live makes me realize that there is normality waiting for me when I get through it all. 

My doctors have been absolutely amazing. I’ve got every ounce of faith that I will overcome these after-effects. I’m just impatient. I know how fit I was before cancer. I climbed and went on walks and runs. Now, struggling to walk along my street, I am just so impatient to get back there again. I know what I can do. 

For other people dealing with the after-effects of cancer, don’t feel as if you should be upbeat all the time. It’s totally okay to struggle with your mental health. Remind yourself how much you’ve done to get through the cancer. You just have to keep that fight going for a bit longer than you thought you would. It isn’t your fault if you are struggling mentally. It’s just your body recovering still. 

Even now, I still haven’t fully accepted my words. I’ve been through a hell of a lot, and I’ve still got that last mountain to climb before I can say I’m well again. I never thought that I’d get cancer. I’m happy with the fact that I received No Evidence of Disease (NED), but life is still just hard some days.

Since talking for this article, I have received further treatment for my lungs, and I am now on an inhaler that has greatly improved my lungs. I am now able to sleep through the night, and I don’t get out of breath as often. I am now all but back to my usual self and am able to get out for walks. Life is feeling more like my life before the cancer. I'm able to go on trips again, and I got a new puppy who encourages me to get out on daily walks. This week sees me taking the first gradual steps of returning to work, signalling that dark times will pass. 

I forward my love and warmest wishes to all of you who are dealing with cancer, whether you are the patient or helping someone go through this awful journey.

Photo courtesy of author.